


Charles and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

by ScarlettJJones



Category: X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - High School, Charles Xavier Needs a Hug, Erik Has Feelings, Erik is a Sweetheart, High School, Honestly Charles What Are You Thinking, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, It's okay in the end, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Protective Erik Lehnsherr, Swimming, What the Heck are Tags?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:15:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25563460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScarlettJJones/pseuds/ScarlettJJones
Summary: Charles hears a rumor about Erik and it hits a nerve.Basically, the rumor going around is how Erik is homophobic, while it's completely wrong.
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Comments: 4
Kudos: 108





	Charles and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

**Author's Note:**

> The title is a rip off from the "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day" book,, and I guess movie now too. lol.
> 
> So, have at it.

Charles unlocks the front door and slams it shut behind him, then makes his way upstairs to his bedroom. Once in his room he throws his backpack in his desk chair and flops down on the bed. He lays there, fully clothed with shoes still on, hoping that sleep will take him now. It’s been a really rough day and a good nap will make him feel better and will help with the ongoing headache that started earlier today.

This morning he woke up late, due to the fact that he stayed up most of the night reading, but he’ll never tell. He got dressed in a haze and sped to school. Showing up late to his first period, forced him to be paired with a half-baked moron who sleeps in class for the English project that Charles knows that he will have to do most, sorry, not most. All. All of the work himself. After lunch he bombed his history test and he thinks that was a first for him. Literally everything that he went over was not on the test. He didn’t even have to stay after to see his grade, he knew he failed, or at the least barely passed. All of that he could deal with. He’s done entire projects by himself before, he has a high A in the class so it won’t drop his GPA that much and he’s still gonna make an A at the end of the class, so he could deal. The thing that nearly pushed him to tears today was in his last class of the day. He hasn’t seen Erik all day, but since their schedules are completely different, he’s used to not seeing him during the school day. He didn’t make it to breakfast this morning with the group, so he didn’t get a chance to see Erik.

The thing that turned the bad day into a terrible one was the part at the end of his French class. The class was done and everyone was waiting on the bell to signal that they could leave. He had nothing to do and since it was his last class of the day and he has two free electives he could go home afterwards. He sat there, scrolling through Facebook when some girls a few desks over had mentioned Erik’s name. They’d been talking for a while, but his name was the only word that Charles heard that peaked his interest.

When people talk about Erik, it’s usually about how scary he looks walking down the hallway, or how hot he is. Most people either hurry to get out of his way or stop and drool at him while he passes. He’s heard most of these girl’s conversations all year, and he’s pretty sure which one it’s gonna be about. He stops scrolling to ease drop, but remains looking at his screen.

“You know, Lehnsherr. The tall guy that wears the black turtleneck like it’s the sixties.” The other girl gives a big ‘OH’ in realization, then the first one continues. “Yeah. Earlier today I saw him shove a guy into the lockers.”

Charles automatically cocks his head in confusion. He composes himself and blindly scrolls through his phone to appear as if he didn’t just react to what they said.

“Did they fight?” the other girl asks.

“The other guy got loud and then Erik walked off.”

“Why did he push him?”

The girl scoffs, “‘Cause that other guy asked him out.”

“Okay, and? He gets asked out a lot, he doesn’t shove them.”

“Erik shoved the guy because he’s a guy.”

Something in Charles crumbles a little bit, he isn’t hearing what he thinks he’s hearing. There's gotta be a misunderstanding. On the girl's part or his own, but she saw him do it? Erik has never said or even done anything that may suggest that he would ever do that, for that reason. Charles isn’t even out to him, or really anyone for that matter besides Raven and Hank. His mind starts flying, going through every situation he can remember of them two that may have suggested that. Charles has been friends with him for only two years after Erik moved here at the end of their sophomore year. Nothing on that matter has ever come up, so they’ve never talked about it.

The first girl sighs, “I kinda liked Erik. He was always nice to me, but to see that he’s homophobic and aggressive like that makes me a bit sad.”

The bell rings and kids trample over each other to get out while Charles is frozen in his seat. Eyes starting to get hot and prickly.

The other girl throws her bag over her shoulder and follows the first one out of the room, “I can’t believe it. I thought he was a good guy.”

The room is empty besides the professor who sees Charles still sitting there, “Xavier, you got a club meeting today?”

Charles grabs his bag and doesn’t make eye contact with his teacher, “Uh, no. Not today. See you later.” He rushes out of class.

And that is how the bad day turned terrible within a matter of minutes. Now he’s drifted off into unconsciousness for a few hours to get some quiet in his brain.

He wakes up and it is dark outside. He must have slept five or six hours. He knows it messed up his sleep schedule even more than what it was, but he honestly doesn’t care at this point. At least it's Friday so he can sleep in tomorrow.

He goes to the bathroom to refill the glass that was next to his bed to drink something down. He heads back to his room and stands at the foot of his bed staring at nothing with tears threatening to expose themselves. He takes a deep breath and sets his glass down back where it came from and walks over to the window. He opens it and climbs out onto the roof that faces his back yard. He sits there with his arms wrapped around his knees for a good while.

Charles has no idea where Raven is. If she was home, she would have woken him up like she usually does. He guesses that she’s out with friends for the night and will come home when it’s midnight or one.

Looking up at the stars helps him clear his mind. He tries to rationalize what he heard today, but his mind is an asshole sometimes and it just keeps bringing up situations where Erik finds out that Charles is gay and hates him for it. Erik won’t want to be friends with him or thinks that he’s disgusted by him and won’t have anything to do with him because Charles is pretty much in love with him and has been since day one.

He takes a deep breath and blows it out quickly, failing at trying to remain calm. He thinks on how he’ll just start distancing himself away from Erik so the hurt won’t be so bad. Once Erik finds out that Charles is gay, he’ll be glad.

“Charles!?” He hears being yelled as his bedroom door swings open.

He jumps and turns around with a surprised yelp. He didn’t even hear the front door open. When his vision isn’t blurred from the quick movement and the adrenaline he sees Erik standing in his doorway.

His stomach turns to knots, “Erik.” He whispers out.

Erik sees him out the window and visibly relaxes, “Oh thank God,” he mutters.

He walks over to the window and climbs through it to join Charles. Erik sits down next to him and sighs, “I called you like six times and texted you about twenty. Raven also called you a dozen times. What have you been doing?”

Charles is shaking, “I came home and went to sleep. My phone is,” He turns around to his room and pauses, “I don’t know where my phone is.”

“You had us worried sick.” He pulls out his phone and pulls up a text screen. “I’ll tell your sister that you’re not dead and with me.”

Charles looks back out across the yard as Erik puts his phone back in his pocket. He can feel Erik staring at him and doesn’t feel like looking back, even if he could.

“What’s wrong?” Erik says.

Charles shakes his head, dismissing him, still not looking at him. He doesn’t have the heart to tell him to leave. As much as he doesn’t want to see Erik right now, he also doesn’t want him to leave because Erik is the one that helps him calm down after the bad days and makes him feel better on the terrible days.

“Charles. What is wrong?” Erik nudges him, “You only come out on the roof when you’re feeling really down.”

“Just a bad day.” is all he can manage.

“Wanna tell me about it?” Erik sits closer.

Charles shakes his head.

“Alright.” Erik says softly and leans against his side. He sits there with Charles, looking up at the stars, feeling the warm wind blowing over the trees and past them. They sit there in silence.

Neither one of them knows what time it is, but Erik knows it’s close to midnight or one considering what time he got here and how dark the sky over the neighborhood is. Charles takes in every moment of this because there won’t be many in the future.

Erik sits up and cracks his neck. He rests his chin in his palm and looks over at Charles, “Hey,” He whispers.

“Mhm?”

“I know what could make you feel at least a little bit better.” Charles can hear the smile in his voice.

“Mhm?” He hums again.

“We go for a little swim.”

Charles shakes his head, “It’s too late to drive down to the lake.”

“I’m not talking about the lake.”

Charles looks at him, then sees that he isn’t looking back up at him. He follows Erik’s line of sight and it leads to the neighbors’ pool. “No.”

“Oh, come on. You have a key to their gate since you’re dogsitting for them.” Erik gives him his best version of puppy eyes, but they’re not the best. “They even told you that you could go swimming if you wanted.”

Charles stares down at him and Erik doesn’t even have to try to do puppy eyes at him, because he falls for Erik’s pretty eyes all the time, “We can’t be loud.” he whispers.

“Done.” Erik says excitedly as he stands up, reaching a hand out towards Charles to help him up.

Maybe Charles could use a distraction from the thoughts in his head that are going to eventually drive him crazy. Even if it’s with the person his thoughts are telling him to run away from. One last night he tells himself. One last night.

They make their way down stairs and out the back door. Erik jogs a bit ahead of Charles then waits for him to meet him at the wooden gate. Charles just flips up the handle and the gate opens.

"I thought you had a key?"

Charles walks past him to their back patio. "Yeah, to the house." He starts to kick out of his shoes.

Erik follows behind him and unlaces his boots next to the small outdoor table they have. He sets them next to Charles'. He looks out across the yard and all of the little solar lamps around the pool and the garden behind it gives the place a soft blue-white glow. It makes it bright enough to see the pool, but the yard is still mostly covered in shadows.

"We didn't get towels." Charles remembers.

Erik waves a hand at him, "It's fine. We'll dry off out here or in your laundry room." He pulls his shirt out from being tucked into his pants and then over his head. Erik drops it on the ground then unbuckles his belt.

Charles watches him out of the corner of his eye and he discards his own clothes. This is all a big reminder that when Erik finds out Charles is gay, he's gonna hate him. It pains him in his chest. He tries his best to shake it off as he folds his own pants and puts them on the table.

He sees Erik standing there with his hands on his hips looking out at the pool. Charles secretly thanks to whoever is listening to his inner monologue that Erik still has his underwear on.

Erik looks over at Charles and grins, then takes about three large steps and he's jumping into the pool.

Charles smiles to himself and walks over to the pool. He steps over the edge and falls in.

Erik comes back out of the water before he does, so he starts swimming in circles around Charles once he's reached the surface.

Charles laughs and watches him swim around him a few times until he stops.

"Phew, now I'm a bit dizzy."

Charles laughs with a roll of his eyes, "Of course you are." Then he starts to swim a few laps of his own.

They eventually calm down and end up floating on their backs around the pool, talking every once in a while.

Charles thinks that if this is his last night with Erik, it's a pretty good one.

After he let that first one through, the bigger, scarier thoughts in his head are banging on the front door, trying to claw and break their way in again. A small one manages to squeeze in through the cracks in the door. It yells at him that he won't find another friend like Erik and how that Erik will wish he never befriended Charles.

Soon enough the door breaks off its hinges and they topple in, completely covering Charles, suffocating him.

Charles shifts his body and he sinks to the bottom of the pool, trying to muffle the noise in his head but they only amplify. The voices are yelling at him so loud he can't focus. They get in his face and scream that Erik will hurt him like he hurt that guy at school. The small part of Charles' mind that he is still in control over tries to yell back that even if Erik hates him, he still wouldn't physically hurt him. But that voice isn't big enough to drown the others.

He violently gets pulled from inside his head as arms wrap around him, dragging him to the surface.

He hits the air and sucks in a deep breath.

"What are you doing!" Erik yells, still holding him above the water.

Charles catches his breath and looks around as Erik sets him back into the water, "I was just, uh, swimming around."

"No, you were at the bottom of the pool, just sitting there. Charles, what is going on?" He demands.

He looks up at him and doesn't know what to say. He can feel the thoughts sneak around and scratching at the sides of his brain. He needs to stop them. He needs them out now!

“Erik, are you homophobic?” Charles blurts out.

Erik recoils hard, “What? No! What?” He is visibly shocked as to what Charles just asked.

Charles doesn't look at him, eyes fleeting all around Erik as he speaks, "This girl in my class was talking to her friend and she said that she saw you shove a guy into the lockers because he asked you out. Because it was a guy that asked you out."

"What the fuck? What? No." Erik stands up fully in the pool, still shocked but now more angry.

Charles feels like drowning, "I'm sorry. It's what she said she saw you do." He lowers in the water, attempting to hide.

"That's a rumor, Charles." Erik's voice drops and he steps closer to Charles, settling back in the water. “I’m an open book with you, I would have told you the truth. Why didn’t you come talk to me?”

Charles can feel his ears get hot. “Because I’m fucking gay, Erik! If that was true how the Hell could I have talked to you about that and see it on your face firsthand? And would you have even told me the truth?” He didn't mean to yell or even come out to Erik. It just flew out of his mouth before he could stop it.

Erik takes a deep breath and calmly responds, “I would have told you that what she said was a complete lie because that’s not what happened. At all." Charles looks at him, waiting for him to continue. Erik gets defensive and a bit of an attitude appears in his voice, mad at the girl, "It a lie because one, it was in the guys' locker room after practice this morning. So she couldn't have seen anything. And two, that guy yelled slurs at me because I pissed him off during practice."

"What?"

"Yeah." He backs up a little bit and swings an arm out to the side as if he was pointing a finger at the guy, his voice raising as he goes. "That asshole threw all kinds of slurs at me in the locker room just because he didn't get his way during practice and doesn't believe that he needs to even practice although his footwork is absolute shit."

Now Charles feels the same anger that Erik does at this guy and he doesn't even know who he is.

Erik takes another deep breath, "He said it in the locker room, away from the coaches just because he knew that shit would get him kicked off the team." Erik throws out an arm again. "He's the racist, homophobic bigot. Not me."

He sighs and relaxes his shoulders. Erik talks quieter this time, not looking at Charles. "Yes, I did shove him into the lockers, because that wasn't the first time he's said shit like that, not just to me. I got in his face and yelled at him. I told him that if he said anything like that again to anyone, I'd beat his ass. Then I walked away because I would have knocked him the fuck out. Right then and there. I can't get suspended for fighting again."

Charles can't even speak, "I- I'm sorry, Erik." He reaches out towards him, but pulls his hand back towards his own chest.

Erik drifts closer to Charles but shakes his head, dismissing his apology, "it's fine."

"No, it's not fine." Charles says. "Erik." He whispers.

Erik moves to be right in front of him, his voice low, "Charles, it's okay. No, I don't like it either, but these things just happen. I told him I'd beat his ass if he did it again. He probably will, just not to me, and I probably won't beat his ass anyways."

"You don't deserve that, and I'm sorry I got caught up in the rumors. I was distracted by my bad day that I didn't even check in with you."

Erik looks at him with a small smile, "It happens to the best of us."

They look at each other for a while before Erik huffs out a small laugh and looks up towards the stars. "It sure is a clear night tonight."

Charles isn't taking his eyes off Erik, "Yeah." He mumbles back.

He reaches out and places a hand on Erik's chest. He's a bit startled at the sudden contact, but he doesn't jump. He slowly looks back at Charles.

Charles feels like he's being pulled towards Erik. Being at the same height as him now, he doesn't have to reach up to be eye to eye with him. He leans forward but stops a few inches from his face to see what Erik will do. He can't read his face, but he's staring back at Charles.

Erik closes the distance between them. Hands come up to the nape of Charles' neck ushering him closer. Charles' own hands slide up and over Erik's shoulders to rest behind his head.

They break apart and stare at each other for quite a while before Erik chuckles and looks away. "I bet this isn't how you thought this day would end."

"Not at all, but I'm not disappointed." Charles says with a small smile.

Erik looks back at him and whispers, "Can I kiss you again?'

Charles whispers back, his smile turned into a grin, "Hell yeah."

He cups Charles' face on both sides and leans forward once more.

Erik slowly starts to guide Charles to the side of the pool to push him against the wall, sandwiching him in between.

They kiss slowly, no need to rush, nowhere to be. They have all the time in the world and right now, nothing else in that world really matters. 

Charles' hands roam across Erik's back and sides, occasionally running his fingers through his hair, something he has wanted to do since they met. Since before this attraction grew into this big one sided emotional turmoil mess, that just so happened to end pretty swell if you ask him yourself.

Charles pulls back slightly to look up at him, "I thought you were straight." He says it as a statement but it comes out more like a question.

Erik shrugs one shoulder, "Eh, kinda, sorta, not really, no."

"Huh?" Charles laughs.

"More Bi than anything, but I don't think too hard on it. Just whatever happens, happens."

"Oh. It never came up, so I didn't know."

Erik laughs and puts his hands on his hips, "Did you just, 'It never came up' me, Mr. 'Because I'm fucking gay, Erik'?"

Charles goes red, "I didn't mean to- it just came out."

"Yeah?" Erik grins, "It just came out?" He leans down to kiss him again, "Well, I'm glad it did."

He smiles into the kiss, "Me too. Despite the circumstances."

This time Erik pulls back with a serious look on his face, "I'm really sorry that hurt you today. I want you to know that I would never do anything like that."

Charles shakes his head lightly and places a hand on Erik's chest, "You don't have to apologize. You did nothing wrong here. I overreacted."

"You had a good reason to. It's understandable."

Charles nods and looks around his neighbor's backyard for a quick second, "Hey?" He whispers, "How about we get out of the pool and make our way back to the house? My fingers are pruny."

"Good idea." Erik backs away slowly and starts heading towards the stairs.

They climb out of the pool and walk their way back to Charles’ back door, still dripping wet. Charles tells Erik that he’s going to get some towels out of the mud room. Erik nods and sits down in a lawn chair.

When Charles gets back Erik is almost dry, and so is he. He still gives him a towel that Erik wraps over his shoulders, covering himself like a blanket.

“Do you have any plans this summer?” Erik asks as Charles sits on a bench next to him.

Charles gives him a weird look, “I’m gonna take a few classes so I have a head start on my college courses and work. I’ve told you this before.”

Erik nods, “Yeah, I know. I was searching for something to say.”

Charles laughs, “It’s okay. You don’t have to. This doesn’t have to be weird now, I mean, it might be a little bit if you don’t want to continue this.” he motions between them. “If you don’t want to, I respect that.”

“No, I do want to continue this, and it’s not weird.” Erik nervously says, “I just wanted to say something, but I didn’t know what to say.”

Erik gets up and moves to sit next to Charles on the bench, he smiles at him. "Can I kiss you?"

"Yeah." Charles smiles up at him and leans forward.

They sit side by side looking up at the sky for who knows how long. Charles reaches out to grab Erik's hand.

Raven walks through the back door to see them sitting on the bench in the yard, Erik’s head is resting on Charles’ shoulder. She smiles to herself and walks back inside.

The sun starts to come out over the horizon and Charles feels a warmth in his chest that has nothing to do with the sun. A contentedness washes over him. He doesn’t know where he’s going next, or where they’re going next, but he doesn’t mind the uncertainty, he rather enjoys the feeling. As long as Erik’s hand is in his and his head on Charles’ shoulder, they’ll figure it out.


End file.
